Tag Archives: golden retriever

Puppy Keep-Away

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Saguaro spent a couple of days being a very grumpy old man about the introduction of a new puppy into our family.  He’s adjusting, though, and they now play a very cute game of puppy keep-away:

Welcome, Holly!

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Our new puppy came home yesterday!  I was going to blog about it, but we’ve been up since the 3:30 a.m. trip to the backyard, so here are a couple of photos while I nap:

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Though this was taken a few days before Holly arrived, it accurately reflects Saguaro’s views of recent developments:

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New year random photo dump

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My 2014 New Year’s resolution is to blog more.  I was inspired by my cousin’s resolution to cancel her gym membership and my brother’s resolution to drink more.  Why should resolutions be designed to bum you out?  Start the year right with a resolution that will make you happy!  So I’m resolving to blog more, play with the dog(s)* more, and eat more pasta.  That first one may increase the down-scrolling and notification-deleting burden on you, my five loyal readers, but just think of it as additional exercise for your typing fingers!

In a move that is essentially burning through a month’s worth of good resolution-keeping material on the first day of 2014, herewith a photo dump from the back half of 2013, that is, random cellphone photos that entertain me without actually being worthy of an entire blog post.

From our favorite Denver deli, The Bagel Deli:  cheesy jalapeño knishes.  Just another reason I love the west!

{Image: photo of handwritten sign advertising "Knishes!!! Cheesy Jalapeno."}

More Denver/Jewish humor:

{Image: lighted sign on the side of a bar reading "Drink Gin & Tonikah/Happy Hanukkah." Above that sign is a vertical sign showing that the bar is The Hornet.}

Behind the bar at Cholon which, besides having scary creatures in wine bottles, has amazing small plates like duck spring rolls.

{Image: a wine bottle with yellow-colored roots and a snake inside.}

Green tea chai latte fail:

{Image: overhead view of cup filled with slightly foamy green liquid.}

Saguaro explaining that it’s time to stop vegging in front of the computer and start throwing the tennis ball.

{Image: photo of laptop keyboard. In the upper right hand corner is a tennis ball and just to the right of that, a dog's nose.}

A little light reading on my way to my cousin’s bridal shower in Portland, Maine.

{Image: photo of newspaper headline, "Shark off Boothbay likely a great white, B1."}

When shopping for yard clean-up, I had to admire the attention to detail in the browser tab icon for Pet Scoop:

{Image: long horizontal clip from the tabs that appear at the top of an internet browser indicating the open tabs. On the left, the tab contains the Google logo of a bright red M, and reads "Inbox - amyfrobertson." On the right, the tab contains an icon resembling a document and reads "Untitled document." In the middle, the tab reads, "Denver Pooper Scoop" and includes a logo resembling a pile of dog poop.}

I know on some level I should be offended by this, but I found myself more amused, and admiring the entrepreneurial spirit.

{Image: signage from front of the Denver strip club called "Shotgun Willie's." The sign reads, "Topless Gift Wrapping Thurs & Fri." The Shotgun Willie's logo above the sign is an oversized shotgun, arcing downward.}

We were very sad to say goodbye to our favorite tapas joint, Ondo’s, where we had a typically amazing meal last night, its last night before closing.  Really hoping the owners will find a good space and reopen elsewhere.

{Image: painted mural with a waiter carrying a tray with a bottle, viewed from the back, and a store front with the logo "Ondo's"}

Then we closed out the year in typical party-animal fashion:

{Image: a few of a sofa, dog and television from the perspective of the person stretched out in the sofa. So along the left side, legs in sweatpants ending in feet in striped socks. Next to the legs a golden retriever; in the background, a tv showing a hockey game.}

Happy New Year to all and onward to 2014!

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*New puppy coming later this month!  Will make the “more blogging” resolution really easy!

Merry Christmas!

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{Image: A golden retriever with a goatee of snow around his mouth.}

I realize I’m reusing last year’s photo, but there’s no snow this year and it’s hard to get Saguaro to pose.  So think of it as very efficient recycling:  Same pixels as last year with no intervening loss of merriness!

More photos from Santa Fe

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Taking photos in Santa Fe is like cheating.  You just point the camera out the back door and voila!

{Image: two bare trees, very slender with white bark against a very deep blue sky.}

Disc Golf Henge:

{Image: snowy field with four small (approximately one-foot-tall) rock formations each in the shape of an inverted "U"}

Fence.

{Image: fence made of vertical pieces of natural wood of varying heights. In the bottom half of the photo, the wood slats are backed by a solid piece of wood. In the top half of the photo, there is nothing behind the vertical slats, and the sun peeks through between two of the slats.}

Fence, HDR.

{Image: fence made of vertical pieces of natural wood of varying heights. In the bottom half of the photo, the wood slats are backed by a solid piece of wood. In the top half of the photo, there is nothing behind the vertical slats, and the sun peeks through between two of the slats.}

Barbed wire, HDR:

{Image: close up of a photo of a single barb in a strand of barbed wire. In the background, and out of focus, is the side of an adobe building.}

I couple of friends we met on our walk.

{Image: A goat peers around the corner of a wood and wire fence. To his left are three chickens, two black and one white.}

Window.  Almost anything looks good in adobe.  Ask Santa Fe!  I think it’s in the building code!

{Image: a window in an adobe wall. The window reflects a very blue sky. Tree branches enter the photo from the right.}

Water spout:

{Image: a flat water spout protrudes from an adobe wall with several feet of frozen water suspended off the end.}

The same water spout, an hour later:

{Image: a flat water spout protrudes from an adobe wall with several feet of frozen water suspended off the end. The adobe is much darker than the previous photo because of the setting sun.}}

Hubble the Golden Retriever discovers that Rodney has a snack.

{Image: in the left side of the photo, a man sits at a table working at a laptop computer. To his right, a golden retriever stares intently at him. The corner of another laptop shows in the foreground; kitchen appliances are in the background. The table has a candle, a water bottle, a card and envelope, a french press with tea and a mug,}

And it wouldn’t be my blog unless I took the opportunity to go just a bit Andy Rooney on your ass.   My rental car was a Prius.  Even after I learned the sequence of button pushing and gear shifting that was necessary to make it go, and adjusted to the fact that it sounded, at every light, like the car had died and I’d need to call a tow truck, there were two more very disconcerting things.

(1)  You don’t need a key to drive the car but you do need a key to unlock it.  This means that when you get in the car, you have to figure out what to do with the key, since it’s not sitting in the ignition.  If I owned a Prius, I would lock the keys in the car at least once per week.

(2) You not only get the general warm, fuzzy, superior feeling of driving a really fuel-efficient car, you get a constant, real-time, animated demonstration of just HOW efficient you’re being:

{Image: photo of a diagram of a car showing three unnamed parts with arrows going from one to another. The diagram is labeled "Energy Monitor." The display also contains the time (3:16 PM) and the odometer (2837.4 MI).}

This little animated diagram changes as you drive, showing — near as I can tell — which direction the little energy hamsters that power the car are traveling.   The diagram is (a) designed for the driver to monitor the car’s energy situation in real time, and thus incredibly distracting and unsafe; (b) not designed to convey anything to the driver, and thus pretty pointless; or (c) designed solely to show the passenger what a cool, energy-efficient person the driver is.

Sit! Stay! Code!

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Saguaro is all set to receive legal software training.

We recently needed to purchase a fourth license for our favorite legal software to install on our remote server.  Unfortunately, there are only three of us (me, Tim, paralegal extraordinaire Caitlin) and the company would not issue two licenses to one person.  I emailed our rep, “Hmmm.  No.  Just the 3 of us.  And the dog:  Saguaro.”

Demonstrating why we love this software and this rep,* she responded:

Ok, so……all kidding aside…I am going to have to assign the license to Saguaro.  LOL!  …  He is going to be contacted for training!

He got his license in the next email:

Dear Saguaro:

Thank you for being a registered licensee for [Software].

Here’s the link to download our … Suite of Software Tools:

. . .

Here is your [Software] Registration Information:

Registration Name: Saguaro Fox

Registration ID:

And, as promised, he was contacted for training.

Hi Saguaro,

My name is [Name], I work in the [Software] training & support department and will be your go to resource for [Software] questions.

I thought I’d check in to introduce myself and see how you’re doing with [Software] tools so far.

And so on.

If Chinook can learn legal research

Chinook on desk

Chinook on bookcase

Saguaro can master this software!

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And for your entertainment, my other attempts to pose Saguaro and a laptop.

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Aaaaaand “Why do you keep making me put my paws there?  I’m done now.”

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*Both the software and the rep will remain nameless, so as not to get anyone in trouble.  Suffice it to say, it’s not Summation:  in my experience, their reps have no sense of humor whatsoever.

Grumpy conehead puppy

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Saguaro has a “hot spot,” the bane of large, hairy dogs.  But also sort of an embarrassing injury, and by “embarrassing” I mean completely avoidable, exacerbated by his own licking, and involving a trip to the vet, shaving, and expensive internal and external antibiotics. 

Dogs in snow

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By popular demand:

Chinook rolling in the snow

Saguaro running in snow

Chinook in the snow

Saguaro in the snow

Chinook in snow

Saguaro shaking off in snow

Chinook in snow